Marriage Community Contract

[RogerJN]

We have asked a Notaire to draw up a marriage community contract for us as we have recently purchased a French property. We are married with 2 adult children and no previous marriages or children!

The Notaire first asked us for "un extrait d’acte de mariage datant de moins de 3 mois". When I offered our original marriage certificate from 1970, he replied that he wanted "un extrait d’acte de mariage, récent,  délivré par la mairie du lieu de mariage." which I have translated as "a marriage certificate, recent, delivered by the town hall of the place of marriage."

However, that doesn't mean a lot to us. Has anyone any idea what the Notaire is after?

 

[Teamedup]

Yes, the bloody STUPID french law that says that such offical documents are not valid for more than three months. That they like to play silly beggars with their own documents is one thing, that they won't accept completely legal documents from another EU country makes my blood boil.

So they want you to go the the registry office where you got married and get them to reissue another marriage certificate with todays date on, and as far as your notaire is concerned that will only be valid for the next three months.

Have you asked your children's permission to do this contract? I realise people on here have done this without asking, but as far as I am aware your children could upon the first death sue the estate as they are being deprived of their inheritance and will have to pay extra taxes after the demise of both parents.

[Sunday Driver]

Why is this law stupid?   What's the reason for the notaire's request?  Does the french equivalent of the registry office get notified if you get divorced in the meantime or you're partner dies?  If it does, then it makes eminent sense to have this procedure to avoid bigamy and fraud.

One could argue that a piece of paper issued by a UK registry office, say, 30 years ago is of doubtful reliabilty as of today.  But then, that would make the UK look stupid. [;)]

[hastobe]

LOL - it will be a sad 'ole day before I ask my kids permission to have

the use of my own money!! - They already seem to think that what's ours

is theirs and what's their's is their own - they don't need any more

encouragement along that path.

We plan is to spend every bit we can before they put that final nail in

- and intend to exit this world knackered and broke...having enjoyed

every second.  In our view our role as parents is to give them the

skills to earn their own wealth.

Hastobe

[Teamedup]

LOL you are right, they don't need encouraging, you moving to France has given them full rights to your biens. And you try and take away their rights and they can sue you. AND as far as I am aware they can have some say in if you try and spend spend spend too.

All a glorious part of the relaxed french way of living n'est pas.

 

 

[hastobe]

LOL - they sue and they lose - trust me [;)]...only part of our estate will be subject to French IHT.  One false move and the rest will go to the cats home.

Hastobe

[Clarkkent]

[quote user="Teamedup"]

LOL you are right, they don't need encouraging, you moving to France has given them full rights to your biens. And you try and take away their rights and they can sue you. AND as far as I am aware they can have some say in if you try and spend spend spend too.

All a glorious part of the relaxed french way of living n'est pas.

Sorry about the state of this post, but I recently installed the Internet Explorer 7 beta browser. There is clearly some incompatibility with this forum's software.

Indeed.

I know an elderly French couple who are trapped in a large house in the Paris banlieu. They have been wanting to move to a smaller house for some years but are prevented from doing so by avaricious children. I also believe (there may have been some translation error on my part) that some element of the French state has questioned their motives in moving to a smaller, more manageable house.

 

 

[/quote]

[hastobe]

I think the difference is that they are probably resident in France and

hence will be deemed to be domiciled there.  As we intend to stay

resident in the UK only the French situ

assets will be caught by French inheritance tax - and having a mortgage

secured on the French property reduces the value of such assets

further.  ( I have a health condition that means the very cold

winters in the Dordogne area are not good - and I will need health care

that we probably couldn't afford in France)

I guess one of the advantages of keeping one foot in each

country...  We would also probably sell our French home if one

spouse

became (life threateningly) ill -  for practical

reasons.  Obviously this won't apply in the case of a sudden death

but nevertheless, because of the above, the proportion of our assets

located in France will be relatively low. 

TBH - Joking apart, I don't think our kids would do that anyway.

Hastobe

[Teamedup]

Yes, sounds like they would lose in your case, but anyone living in France should realise that children's rights are part of the way things are in France.

[hastobe]

Sorry - yes I agree, once resident in France you are stuck.  Went

a little off track - sorry. I think its the thought of my spendthrift

teenagers blowing our hard earned assets!

Hastobe

[Teamedup]

my spendthrift teenagers blowing our hard earned assets

 

LOL I thought that they all did that.

[Translator]

[quote user="Sunday Driver"]

Why is this law stupid?   What's the reason for the notaire's request?  Does the french equivalent of the registry office get notified if you get divorced in the meantime or you're partner dies?  If it does, then it makes eminent sense to have this procedure to avoid bigamy and fraud.

One could argue that a piece of paper issued by a UK registry office, say, 30 years ago is of doubtful reliabilty as of today.  But then, that would make the UK look stupid. [;)]

[/quote]

Hello SD,

Yes, there ARE reasons for requiring an up-to-date birth/marriage certificate.

Obviously your date or place of birth can't change (sorry no-one can lie about

their age anymore) but other things do change and French birth certificate

changes with them. It can contain the following information :

• les nom, prénoms et mention
  du sexe de la personne concernée (family name, first name, sex)
• l'année, le jour, l'heure
  et le lieu de naissance (year, day, time of birth)
• éventuellement : les
  mentions de mariage, divorce, séparation de corps ou décès (marriage
  divorce, separation)
• éventuellement : les
  mentions relatives à la nationalité française (déclaration enregistrée,
  perte, réintégration, naturalisation) (registration, obtention, loss, regaining of French nationality)
• éventuellement :la mention
  de la première délivrance du certificat de nationalité française (delivery
  of nationality papers)

A marriage

certificate in France

contains the following information:

• les nom, prénoms, dates et
  lieux de naissance de chacun des époux (family names, first names, dates
  and places of birth of both spouses)
• la date du mariage (date)
• les mentions relatives au
  régime matrimonial (prenuptual agreements)
• éventuellement : les
  mentions relatives au divorce ou à la séparation de corps (divorce
  seperation)

Now some

may say that because a British birth/marriage certificate doesn't change why

should the French authorities ask for an up-to-date British one? The answer is

probably that every country's certificates contain slightly different

information (they all certainly use different formats) and so no country

can adapt to all others.

I hope this helps,

Peter

[Tony F Dordogne]

If it makes things easier you can order a copy of your marriage certificate online from the UK's ONS, think it's 1837.com.

It will be dated the day that the copy is made, costs £6.50, will arrive within a week and I think that should help you out with your predicament.

 

[Translator]

[quote user="Tony F Dordogne"]

If it makes things easier you can order a copy of your marriage certificate online from the UK's ONS, think it's 1837.com.

It will be dated the day that the copy is made, costs £6.50, will arrive within a week and I think that should help you out with your predicament.

 

[/quote]

The site I send people to is www.gro.gov.uk/gro/content  which I'm sure you can get to from the site mentioned above. The price has gone up a little now to £11.50

[hastobe]

Our notaire has told us that we don't need an up to date copy - the original is fine.

hastobe

[Translator]

[quote user="hastobe"]Our notaire has told us that we don't need an up to date copy - the original is fine.

hastobe

[/quote]

Hastobe We all need Notaries for different reasons and maybe your need was different to RogerJN's. Requiring an up-to-date certificate is very common for major transactions, weddings, nationality changes, etc. and if you didn't need one, you were either lucky or your need was different.

Peter

[hastobe]

Nope - its exactly the same - we have an appointment next week (Thursday) to have a community marraige contract drawn up.

Hastobe

[oldgit72]

[quote user="hastobe"]

Nope - its exactly the same - we have an appointment next week (Thursday) to have a community marraige contract drawn up.

Hastobe

[/quote]

 

 

 

For the CU to be effective from an IHT standpoint and ensuring that the surviving spouse retains 100% of the assets, I understand that a clause d'attribution is necessary.

You might want to ensure, if not already done, that this is included.

 

 

[hastobe]

We specifically asked the notaire because of this thread and the notaire said that no, the photocopy of our original marraige certificate (that he already had) was sufficient.  Maybe different notaires takes different views on this because divorce details aren't included on UK certificates?

Hastobe